


King's Gambit

by Pereprin



Category: Strange Magic (2015)
Genre: F/M, Human Bog, Human Marianne, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Modern AU, butterfly bog
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-05
Updated: 2016-04-22
Packaged: 2018-04-07 20:39:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4277166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pereprin/pseuds/Pereprin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Inspired by a Tumblr prompt.</p><p>When Marianne's anger gets her in trouble, her perfect little world falls apart. Heartbroken, betrayed, and mad as hell, she can either go work for the detestable Bogart King, or kiss her future goodbye. The way forward comes with its own dangerous complications.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Bad Blood

**Author's Note:**

> This is waitingxinxsilence's fault. I needed to start this prompt, and this scene is what happened first. I anticipate a slow build because HEY, it's me. Also, I'm sorry to everyone else who uses "Bogart" as Bog's human name. There aren't a lot of "Bog" names of Gaelic origin. At least not that I've found. Be warned, I took a creative liberty and switched the paternal relationships around to better suit my needs. I do what I want.
> 
> Tags to be added as content changes. M for now because of salty language. Also lol for chess references that I don't understand. Comments are welcome!

There were worse things that could happen to a twenty-something in Seattle than getting fired. Innumerable, terrible, awful things.

She just couldn’t think of any in that exact moment.

Worse, though – it hadn’t happened yet. It would. The other shoe was about to drop, and waiting for it was making her antsy. She picked at her ruined manicure, wincing as she pressed down just a bit too firmly on a freshly bruised knuckle.

She’d been a very successful senior editor at Autumn Publishing for four years and had her eye on the Editor-in-Chief title. She didn’t know anything else. What would she do? Where would she go? Where _could_ she go after all of this? She’d heard Starbucks wasn’t so bad after a few years. Nice benefits. She could become a professional barista, which would be the _perfect_ application her bachelor’s degree. What if she couldn’t make rent anymore? She’d be in an alley, fighting over shopping carts and the warm bit of concrete next to the burning trash bins. The only thing left of her once-promising career would be her face in the papers, contorted in rage, and her fist, connecting soundly with Roland King’s face.

Roland Fay. Her ex-fiancé. And the son of her boss, the CEO of Autumn Publishing. She was currently sitting in his office on the twentieth floor, surrounded by expensive-looking mahogany shelves the expensive-looking books lined up neatly in each row.  
  
George Fay cleared his throat and interrupted her as she mentally applied for food stamps.

He sat there with his salt and pepper beard and fine grey suit, all dressed up like some overstuffed lumberjack-playing-business man. “I want you to know that I bear you no ill will. This has been difficult for all of us. Especially Roland.”  
  
She snorted. “Especially Roland, I’m sure.”

He let her comment go.

“What he did was inexcusable, but I can’t just look the other way after one of my employees _punches my son in front of news cameras_. The ends don’t justify the means. And your means were very… public.”  
  
Marianne had the good sense to at least _appear_ apologetic. “George, I didn’t intend for this to be as public as it was. At all. But after what he pulled? I just... couldn't help it.”  
  
George sighed and sat back in his expensive, high-backed leather chair. “I get that, I really do. But I also can’t condone that behavior. And I’m under quite a lot of pressure to nip this in the bud.”  
  
She knew this was coming. She’d have been stupid to expect this to go any other way. All that was left was damage control. “Look, if you’d just let me explain to the press, or-“  
  
He shook his head.

“Roland can’t afford any more bad press. He has to inherit this company someday, and he's got to look like he’s turned over a new leaf.”  
  
“But he hasn’t! He _cheated_ on me! His fiancé! And I’m ninety percent sure he’s getting high again. If I can't clear my name, I'm ruined in this business. Are we just going to ignore these little details?” She gestured wildly at nothing in particular, the motion born entirely out of exasperation.

“… Yes. We are,” he replied calmly.

Marianne’s heart thudded in her throat. Her reply was strained.  
  
“… Are you fucking serious right now?”  
  
George’s expression hardened. “Careful, Marianne. I haven’t fired you yet,” he warned.

“You mean you…won’t?” A pathetic twinge of hopefulness managed to worm its way into her voice.

He buried the notion quickly. “Oh, no. You are absolutely fired. But we have to sort a few things out before that’s made official. Like, I need your word that you won’t give them a statement about what happened. You will not comment. At all.”

She leaned forward, fists balled against her knees and her features awash with disbelief. She caught herself with her mouth open and snapped it shut before blurting out her protest.  
  
“What?! _No_! You think you can just tell me to keep quiet? In case you hadn’t noticed, my reputation’s kind of on the line here, too. And I can fix that really, really easily.” She hadn’t meant to sound quite so threatening, but there it was.

George sighed yet again, as though he’d predicted all of this and was absolutely bored that he needed to go through the motions. The sound made her want to drive a fist through his Macbook.

“I figured as much. Marianne, know that I do regret what happened. My son’s actions are inexcusable. But I have this company to look after, and he is its future. And I can’t have you dredging up what we worked so hard to bury. So I’m going to make you a deal.”

She went still for a moment, fixing him with a burning gaze as she waited for his proposal.  
  
“One of the execs at Forest & King is looking for a personal assistant.”  
  
A pit dropped in her stomach like a bomb. Forest & King. Their direct competitor, a massive publishing house that seemed to exist to poach clients from Autumn. They fought dirty. Years of research and competitive analysis forced her to develop her own intense disdain for the publisher, especially its detestable, unapologetic, bane-of-the-presses Partner and CEO-  
  
“Bogart King has agreed to take you on.”  
  
And there it was. The icing on the shit cake.

Marianne let out a loud groan, a mixed sound of dismay and disbelief. Her head rolled back and shoulders sagged. She could have thrown up. This was all too damn much.  
  
“You want me to go be King’s personal assistant? You want me to work for your _competition?_ How do you think that’s going to look?”

“Like a scorned employee trying to get back at her former employer by joining up with a notorious competitor.”

She let slip a sharp, humorless laugh.  
  
“And you’re not at all worried that I will completely and totally destroy you? C’mon, George. You know what I know.”  
  
He shrugged and responded lightly. “Oh, I’m sure you’ll try. But no. I’m not worried.”  
  
She was sorely mistaken. There were far worse things in heaven and earth than being fired.  
  
It took a few seconds for realization to dawn. Marianne knew exactly what he was doing. It hit her like a bolt through the heart. Despite George and Roland Fay, she loved this company. She’d spent four years of her life here. Personal entanglements aside, it was her dream job. Four years of school at a private university and an English degree later, here she was, reviewing manuscripts. She was exactly where she wanted to be.  
  
_Was_.  
  
There were good people here, the man in front of her and his spawn notwithstanding. Whatever she did to exact her revenge would have very real repercussions for the people she’d come to call friends. Her mentors, her allies…  And they didn’t’ deserve to go down with the ship. The two people she wanted to suffer for this couldn’t fall without causing collateral damage. Inside her, rage lapped at her insides like flames. That crushing sense of defeat didn’t linger long before the anger swelled and swallowed everything else.  
  
She stewed in furious silence.

George Fay broke the quiet.  
  
 “Come on, Marianne. How about some gratitude? We won’t press charges, we won’t speak of it again. We’ll write our story and move along: you blew up at my son after a spat and called off your engagement. You'll look for new avenues to advance. Your career will survive.”  
  
Yes, her career as a humble maidservant to the Darth Vader of modern publishing. Her frustration mounted. If she’d been anywhere else in that moment, she might have started crying.  
  
“I won’t do it,” she blurted.  
  
“You will. Or I will make sure you never, ever work in Seattle again. I don’t want to do that, but I will if you don’t work with me here.” He paused. “King pays well. If you want a settlement, name your-“

Marianne’s temper flared and her voice trembled as she struggled to contain it. She felt herself teetering on the edge of violence. “Christ, George. It’s me. I was at your _wedding_. I deserve better than this.”

“I’m sorry, Marianne. I truly am,” To his credit, there was just a hint of what Marianne thought might have been genuine regret, but she chose to ignore it. She was beyond placating.  
  
Her nostrils flared. “Yeah, right. I can tell by how hard you just screwed me.”

George responded with indignation. “Did you honestly think you could assault my son, threaten to tarnish his reputation, and expect to walk away from it scot-free?”

Her composure dissolved. She stood abruptly, hazel eyes alight with unadulterated hatred. She didn’t feel the same compulsion to strike him as she had with Roland, but the fury there was raw and would not be contained any longer. Painted lips curled over her teeth. She snarled.

“Well maybe you shouldn’t have given your giant douche bag of a son so many chances to show the rest of this fucking country how much of a goddamn _dick_ he is! You know what? I get to be angry about this right now. Really goddamn angry, and you get to hear me out until you pull the fucking trigger. I knew it was a fucking gamble giving Roland a second chance, but _you?_ Clearly, I was stupid for assuming that at the very least, _you_ wouldn’t stab me in my goddamn back. But no, oh ho _ho_ , I can see cleeeearly now, George Fay. I see what you really are.”  
  
She bent at the waist and slammed her open palms down against the edge of his desk. Short shocks of unruly hair slipped into her eyes. The gorgeous glass baubles she’d always admired shook loudly against his desk. One rolled off and thudded dully on the carpet.

Marianne’s voice lowered, damn near a growl as she bared teeth. “You’ve got your deal. I’ll shut up. I’ll take the job. I’ll move on with my life and you will keep your fucking money. I'll take my severance and then I don’t want a dime from you ever again. And I will be just dandy for it. But you and Roland will never stop being sleazy, two-timing, spineless sacks of shit and I will curse your fucking _hearts_ until the day I die. ”

There was white at the edge of her vision. She was vaguely aware that she was out of breath and panting softly.

“Marianne?” George asked plainly after a brief pause.  
  
“What?” she spat.  
  
“You’re fired.”  
  
Marianne heaved a massive sigh. “ _Finally_.”  
  
“Now get the fuck out of my office.”

Boy howdy, did she ever.  
  
  
 

 


	2. When Skies Are Grey

“What is _wrong_ with you?!” Dawn shrieked through a mouthful of popcorn. Marianne blinked as a spewed kernel hit her nose.

Marianne looked down, offering a bashful smirk that hurt to keep up.

She slumped back into the cushions of her IKEA couch, cradling her second – maybe third? – glass of wine to her chest. She tucked her legs underneath her. Dawn sat cross-legged with a bowl of popcorn straddled in the space between them. When her sister managed to chew and swallow through her surprise, she exhaled loudly and retrieved her own glass from the table.  
  
'Container Wars' blared in the background, but they’d long-since forgotten about it. It was all just noise as Dawn chided her.  
  
“Seriously. I just… cannot believe you said ‘ _yes_.’”  
  
Marianne choked on her wine. When she could breathe again, she cocked a brow. She replied thickly, her throat still tight as muscles worked to swallow. “Totally not the response I was expecting.”  
  
“What, you thought I’d scream at you for slugging Roland and compromising your job? I’m just sorry I suggested you let him take you out to dinner forever ago. I mean, damn. He was so cute. Never for a second thought he was an asshole. Who’d have thought?”  
  
To be fair, Dawn had never been very discerning in her choice of romantic partners either. Neither of them had a great track record of being good judges of character.

Marianne pressed a free hand to her temple while her eyes wandered. It’d been hours since she marched out of Autumn publishing with a banker’s box full of her precious few personal belongings. The drive home was a long one, made tolerable only by the Pandora playlist she’d carefully curated for trying times such as these. She nearly ran a red light while she belted out Kelly Clarkson.

She felt ridiculously tired and was sure she looked it. Though she did feel slightly less murderous after a long shower and change of clothes. Terry cloth shorts and an old swag t-shirt did the trick. She was the epitome of comfort, a little wine-fueled furnace in her belly. The heartache she ought to have felt was a distant pain. Perhaps it was all too new. Perhaps shock had lessened the blow. 

She knew herself well enough, though. She’d feel it all in time. All she could do in that moment was lick her wounds among good company. Specifically, her sister.  
  
A breath held in her chest for a while. At last. Marianne heaved a heavy, defeated sigh. “No, I should have known better than to get involved with the boss’ kid. That was a gamble. A huge fucking gamble. I just didn’t expect it to blow up so horribly. Things were actually... really great for while.”

Dawn drained her glass and set it on the table. She stretched her legs out in front of her, her black leggings providing a stark contrast to the oversize white shirt she wore. Marianne noted dimly she was either brave or stupid wearing white while drinking a red. The popcorn bowl was back in Dawn's lap. She chased one fistful with another in quick successions.

This was why Marianne bought popcorn in bulk now.  
  
“What was I supposed to do, then? Tell Fay to fuck off?”  
  
“Well it kind of sounds like you did. Or tried to, at least,” Dawn popped another fluffy kernel into her mouth with an audible crunch.  
  
It was the only thing Dawn ever ate that made her chew with mouth open. Marianne had dumped guys for lesser offenses. With Dawn, she didn’t mind. It was almost endearing. Her eyes drifted past Dawn’s head, out the window behind her. The setting sun cast a waning orange and pink hue over the skyline. Street lamps flickered on, their white glow mingling with the fading orange reflections that bounced off buildings towering in the distance. She could see the Puget Sound from her apartment. A sliver of a moon peeked out from behind a curtain of fading blue and scattered clouds.

The sight of the night's return filled her with a calm she couldn’t describe.

“You know what I mean. I’d rather have a shit job than no job.”  
  
“What could he _really_ do that would get you blacklisted here? This all sounds an awful lot like blackmail. And I don’t think he can back it up… Can he?”

Marianne shrugged. “He knows a lot of people and, for some reason, they listen to him. Hell, if he can get Forest & King to take me, who knows what else he can do? I mean, sure, there’s always retail, or fields that I don’t care about. But I _can’t_ go backward. I worked so hard to get here, Dawn. I can’t let him take that from me.”

She’d busted her ass to get through college. She lived off gas station food just so she could keep making student loan payments well before she ever found a ‘big girl job.’ She never stopped writing; paid or voluntary. She bulked up her resume until there wasn’t any room left in the margins. She fought tooth and nail for that editor position at Autumn. She’d cried after she hung up with the HR rep at Autumn, those words of congratulations still ringing in her ears.

Those were memories he couldn’t touch. But if she didn’t do something about this arrangement, it would all be for nothing. Worst of all, it wouldn’t be on her terms.

Marianne felt anger boiling up inside her again. She doused it with another long pull from her wine glass.

Dawn pursed her painted pink lips, features darkening in a way that didn’t suit her at all. Dawn was a sunspot. Blonde and bubbling and refreshingly thoughtful, despite the airs she put on to put the opposite sex at ease.

 “Well… you could look for something else. Outside of Seattle.”

They both grew quiet for a beat.

“What, leave you all by your lonesome? Who will come over and yell at the TV with you?” Marianne offered a wry smile that she intended to be reassuring. In truth, the thought _had_ crossed her mind, but she found herself completely opposed to the notion.

No way in hell would she leave her family over this.

Dawn’s face lit up with a smile that eased some of the tension that seized Marianne in that moment.

“You’re right. I couldn’t live in a world where my sister doesn’t come over and yell ‘Play with your _fucking_ cat!’ during every episode of ‘My Cat From Hell.’”  
  
Marianne snorted. She snuck a hand out to try and steal the popcorn away. “If you can’t appreciate my commentary, you’re not allowed to appreciate my popcorn.”  
  
Dawn raised the bowl out of Marianne's reach, well over her head. Marianne lunged for it and nearly toppled over. By some miracle, she managed to set her empty wine glass on the table before any damage could be done.  
  
Laughter filled the room and the events of the day seemed, in that instant, like distant memories. Dawn shrieked as Marianne swiped at the. Owl. “You wanna fight, nerd?”  
  
“Only if you want to lose, sunshine!” Marianne cackled and swung a leg sideways, hooking Dawn around the waist. It sent her falling sideways off the couch. Marianne snatched the bowl away while Dawn flailed for balance.

Marianne sat back with her prize, looking quite pleased with herself.

Dawn grunted and wound upright again, hands splayed in the carpet. She leaned forward to rest her chin on the edge of the cushion, a Cheshire grin splitting her lips.  
  
“Good to see all those years on the fencing team are finally paying off,” Dawn teased.  
  
Marianne plucked a plush rainbow pillow out from behind her and brought it down soundly over Dawn’s head with a dull ‘thump.'

The two of them sat in easy silence for a short bit, grinning stupidly at each other. After a time, Marianne found herself wanting very much to change the subject. “How are things at work for you? Still liking the job?”  
  
Dawn shrugged, her head still propped on the edge of the couch.

“Yeah, it’s going okay. I still can’t stand the other girl in my office. She never uses headphones and she has the _worst_ phone voice. The studio stuff is fun, though.”  
  
Dawn had been at a fairly successful architectural firm for about a year, working as a studio coordinator. Based on Marianne’s observations, she was fantastic at it and made friends quickly. Friends that held sway over just how quickly she could get promoted. Marianne suspected this was all being downplayed that night for her benefit, but she refrained from pointing that out.  
  
“Well, you never know. She could just, like… die one day.”  
  
“Marianne. That’s terrible.” Dawn scolded, her tone deadpan.  
  
“I’m kidding. Mostly. How’s Sunny doing? I feel like I haven’t seen him in forever.”  
  
Dawn’s smile returned in full force. “He’s good. He’s going shopping with me this weekend. I told him I’d buy him lunch if he’d help me pick out a dress for the office fall gala.  He says ‘hi,’ by the way.”

Marianne had to stifle a laugh that might give her away. She was fairly certain at this point that Sunny didn’t need any kind of bribe to convince him to watch Dawn try on anything. She just wondered how long it would take Dawn to figure it out.

“Well that’s good. He seems like nice a guy. I think. I've been wrong before.”  
  
Silence returned, but beneath the calm lingered an underlying sense of dread. Marianne was gradually sliding back to that place where fear and doubt cast a shadow over everything - that place where she thought she'd never know a happy thought again.  
  
Dawn spoke first, rousing Marianne from her spiral of downward thinking.  
  
“Maybe it’ll be okay. Maybe working for King won’t be that bad,” came a small voice. Dawn had turned around to lean back against the couch, arms encircling her knees. Her eyes were trained elsewhere.  
   
As much as Marianne wanted to believe that, she couldn’t.

“Trust me, he’ll be bad,” Marianne grumbled.

“But you haven’t met him, right?”

“I don’t need to meet him to know that he’s an ass.”  
  
Dawn gestured toward the TV. “I’m just saying, this can only paint a two-dimensional picture. Seems a little unfair to base your judgment of someone off of one person’s story. Y’know? Weren’t _you_ the one who used to harp on about media bias?”  
  
Marianne opened her mouth to protest, but she couldn’t put together a diplomatic answer.  
  
Two-dimensional though it may have been, the picture of Bogart King that lived in her mind was framed with a sparse few terse interviews that led Marianne to believe that King might as well be running a waste management plant for all the import he placed on the institution of publishing. He was a man who admitted, proudly, even, that he rarely cracked open a single book his company published. Despite his piss-poor public image, Forest  & King still retained the rights to some of the most successful series and authors of the day. They signed some of the best up and coming writers and that didn't seem like it would change any time soon. King was a business man, plain and simple. He was there to make money, and to do it as efficiently as possible.

Giselle Forest, on the other hand, balanced out his obvious disdain for the craft with her eccentricities and whimsy. Marianne was certain that Forest was what kept Forest & King’s spirit alive. She’d eagerly perused Glass Door several years ago when she was still evaluating his character and found a comically scathing collection of reviews that all made Bogart King out to be Satan in a suit; unapproachable, acerbic in his manner, embittered by god knew what, and prone to bouts of rage that rivaled Marianne’s.

Giselle’s, on the other hand, were consistently quite kind. She wondered how the two existed in the same space.

Marianne exhaled slowly. “Guess I’m going to find out real soon.”

“When do you start?”  
  
“Monday.”

“Hey, at least you have the weekend to chill out,” Dawn offered brightly.  
  
“Or, y’know, obsess about it,” Marianne countered with a grim thought.  
  
“No sense in worrying about what you can’t fix today,” Dawn reached across the table for the bottle of wine and set about refilling their glasses. “So we might as well get plastered and deal with it tomorrow.”  
  
Marianne smirked as they brought their glasses together, reveling in the soft sound of chiming glass. “This is a great plan and I'm happy to be a part of it.’”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More slow build, I know. We're due for some Bog in the next chapter.


	3. Nothing Good Will Come of This

Monday arrived like a freight train through the front door. Her cell alarm blared, jerking her out of a league-deep sleep.  
  
She stank of cheap alcohol and regret.

Once she and Dawn popped open that first bottle of wine on Friday night, bottles kept opening long after her sister left. Marianne spent the entire weekend cycling through two states: comfortably sloshed, and bone-achingly sober. During the buzzed bouts, she cleaned her apartment furiously. She vacuumed the couch cushions, polished her sabre, re-organized her cupboards - what precious few pieces of dishware she owned - and sorted her mail. Twice.             

When that comfortable numbness started to ebb, thoughts of Roland and her career bubbled up to the surface of her consciousness. She chased them away with glass after glass of whatever she could find. There was only one incident where she didn’t get to the store in time and ended up back at her apartment, silent and face down on the kitchen floor, mourning what she’d lost, though unsure as to which she missed more.  

Marianne half expected Roland to call, but given how they’d parted, it was unlikely that he'd try. Frankly, she wasn’t sure how she’d react if he did attempt to reach out to her. Aside from screaming at him. She’d gone ahead and deleted every text, email, and photo he’d ever sent - damn, that man took a lot of selfies. She left his number programmed in there so she’d at least have some warning if he did call. His custom ringtone went away, too. She sulked a bit when she realized she probably wouldn’t be able to listen to ‘Crazy in Love’ for a good while without wanting to put her fist through a wall.

By Sunday night, she’d drank her liquor cabinet dry. With the last of her self-pity used up, she finally found some clarity. Marianne dug the workout clothes out of her hamper and went for a run in Volunteer Park.

August in Seattle was when Marianne remembered why she and Dawn moved there in the first place. Warm, breezy days, mild nights, and the rain that oppressed them nine months out of the year was nowhere to be seen. Colors seemed brighter and the air had a sweetness to it that Marianne swore she could taste. Summer here was a living thing, and when it did eventually leave them, she missed it dearly. But those precious few months of natural perfection were worth every day of damp, dismal darkness.

Her head throbbed horribly, but the lungfuls of sea air reinvigorated her. She slogged through her pain, Rachel Platten’s ‘Fight Song’ blaring in her ears and urging her onward. She knew it was a campy choice, but in that moment, she didn’t care. It did the trick. Marianne mouthed the words as she pounded the pavement, savoring the feel of her own heartbeat thudding in her chest - a strong, steady rhythm that became a wordless anthem.

She thought the run would be all the detox she needed.

As it turned out, livers did not work that way.

The vision of Marianne and her sunset jog, with the wind blowing majestically through her hair, didn’t match up with the Marianne that stared back at her in the bathroom mirror. White knuckles gripped the ceramic edge of her sink, shoulders hunched. Dark, puffy bags sagged under her eyes. Her hair, normally wispy and gravity-defying after a bit of styling, stuck out at odd angles. Chapped lips contrasted harshly against pale skin.  
  
 _I look like a moon troll._

Despite her outward appearance, dehydration, and the splitting headache, she felt good. Better than she expected to that morning. She managed not to shed a single tear in the wake of it all, and now she had her armor on - pieces of it, at least. Whatever this day threw at her, she’d survive.

Provided she kept her bloodstream full of ibuprofen.

Marianne reached out toward her blurred reflection and wiped away a streak of fog from the mirror. Staring into her hazel eyes, she saw her own grim determination.

“Get strong, girl. You’ve got a hell of a day ahead of you.”

 

* * *

 

 

Marianne didn’t bother with frills. She dressed to get shit done. Grey slacks, a short-sleeve fuchsia blouse, black flats, and a sweater to match. She finished the ensemble off with her preferred war paint: liner and shadow around the eyes just dark enough to make a statement.

Forest & King was headquartered in an old six-story brick building that was once a textile factory in the Industrial District. The publishing house occupied the fifth and sixth floors.

It still had a very rough feel to it, but Marianne found it to be more charming than cold, despite how much she wanted to hate the place on principle. Whoever renovated the space had really gone to town with the Pacific Northwest rustic-chic motif. The glass walls that framed the ground floor opened to a sprawling lobby and a gorgeous span of rich, dark wood flooring.

Once she emerged from the elevator, she discovered that the fifth floor was more of the same, except – somehow – more grand than the first. The two floors had become one, in a sense. The center of the floor opened into an atrium, and Marianne could see straight up to the sixth. Offices lined the perimeter, accessible by several sets of stairs throughout the atrium. There were tables, desks, sitting areas, and scattered blocks of cubicles throughout.  It was more of what she’d seen in the lobby: dark, stained wood, industrial-styled furniture, but sparing with the trappings. It was as though someone had brought the outside in.

When she looked up, her breath caught in her chest: a massive web of branches hung suspended in the middle of the latticed ceiling. It looked as though someone had cut the boughs off a gargantuan tree at the trunk and hung it up as an ornament. As she looked more closely, she saw numerous strings of unlit Christmas lights woven around the branches. She caught herself gaping just as someone warbled cheerfully behind her.

“Morning! Can I help you?”

Marianne spun around, reflexively smoothing down the front of her blouse as her jaw snapped shut with an audible clicking of teeth. She cleared her throat and replied before ever really registering just who she was speaking to.

… A gangly, slip of a guy balancing thick, black-rimmed glasses on a button nose. He wore a white collared shirt and a black skinny tie.

“I’m Maria-“

“Oh! Oh! Oh man, you’re Marianne Alder! Oh man, hold on – Stuff! _Stuff_!”

“What?!” A deep, raspy voice barked from the office behind him.

“Marianne’s here!”

“That’s great – now we can start the song and dance number. Bring her in already!”

“Can I just say, Marianne – can I call you ‘Mary?’ Or ‘Anne’? Wait. Nevermind. ‘Marianne’ goes better with your hair – anyway, that picture of you? In the Times? Literally the best thing I’ve seen all week. And the memes are amazing.”

“Can we not-“

“I made it my lock screen. Check it out.”

He sidled up next to her and dug his phone out of his pocket. Sure enough, there she was: Marianne’s face, frozen in unbridled anger with her fist buried in Roland’s jaw... on this man’s iPhone.

“You’re, uh… you’re down to one bar, buddy.”

He didn’t appear to register the comment, but overflowed with enthusiasm. It was starting to nauseate her.

“I’m Greg Thang! Or just Greg. Or Thang. That’s cool, too. I’m one of the human resources coordinators. Oh! Shit, you’re supposed to be doing onboarding stuff. This way!”

Finally, they were actually moving toward that office. Inside, a stocky, androgynous-looking person was pulling folders out of a filing cabinet. Marianne accepted the ambiguity and moved on. She didn’t want to go down that path today.

“Sorry about Thang. He was born without social grace. We try not to hold it against him, but it’s really hard. I’m Chris Stuff. I hope you like paperwork.”

“And gift baskets! We got you a gift basket-”  
  
“It’s a little care package-”

“-for new hires.”

Sure enough, Thang hauled a massive basket up from under his desk.  
  
Marianne stared blankly at it, her tone devoid of sentiment. “Wow. Yeah, that’s definitely a gift basket. Thank you?”

Thang wrinkled his nose at it and started to gently peel the cellophane away. “Oh wait, I should probably check-”

Stuff ambled over to assist him in prodding its contents. They began talking over each other.

“Do you have any nut allergies?”  
  
“-at least five kinds of nuts in here.”

“-thought you were going to get the other one?”  
  
“But this one had a bird on it-”

They bombarded her with a slew innocuous comments and questions. They were absolutely relentless and she caved quickly, hoping each answer would be the last. By the end of it all, they knew her favorite flavor, pastry, preferred post-it note color, and least favorite movie.

Fifty forms later - or perhaps closer to an hour, as it was only ten in the morning when she signed the last one - she escaped that office.

Though she did managed to walk away with a new Macbook Pro.

Stuff and Thang led her upstairs, and she was treated to a rapid fire tour of the building.  
  
Neither of them stopped talking long enough for Marianne to interject, nor did their conversation seem to be of any consequence to her, so she tuned out completely and her thoughts turned to other matters.   
  
Perhaps that had been a mistake.  
  
“-or else he’ll just throw it at you,” Thang finished matter-of-factly.   
  
“ _What_?” Marianne returned to the conversation fashionably late. She shifted her focus, attempting to catch up, but Stuff had moved on.  
  
“Yep, that’s pretty much all you need to know.”  
  
“Can I get all of that in email-form or something?” Marianne fidgeted with the strap of her bag.  
  
She received a grating chorus of laughter in reply. It ended abruptly when Marianne didn’t join in.  
  
“Oh, you’re serious. Gosh, I’m sorry...”  
  
“I wouldn’t worry about it, Marianne. It’s all common sense stuff.”

_Common sense. Great. I’ve got plenty of that._

The next few minutes were a mess. In her space, time stood still. She felt as though she was moving through molasses, while Stuff and Thang walked and talked rapidly around her. A vortex of color of noise while she struggled with three simple questions: _What am I doing here? What is happening? Where is my life going?_  
  
She came back to reality with a start, and when she did, she was alone.  
  
Marianne craned her head around to see Stuff and Thang behind her, making their way back downstairs. The sound of their parting words rang in her ears, but she couldn’t decipher what they meant.

Two heavy oaken doors stood before her. She thought them odd given the relatively modern decor throughout the rest of the building, but she found them oddly charming. A matching plaque had been nailed to them. Bogart King. Partner and CEO.   
  
Her jaw set. Fists balled at her sides. She inhaled determination and exhaled apprehension. She felt her armor slide back into place. Marianne steeled herself in preparation for whatever awaited her behind that door. He couldn’t have the upper hand.  
  
She would not be a wilting flower today.  
  
With a sudden and explosive burst of will, Marianne grasped the crude iron handles and shoved forward. She threw the doors open and took a decisive step across the threshold.

It may have been a rash choice, as was usual when it came to how she dealt with trying situations. But it was too late to second-guess herself.  
  
“All right, let’s get a few things straight,” she declared as she marched forward.  
  
“I don’t know what kind of racket you’re running from Fay, but I am not going to be a pawn in this scheme. From nine to five, I’ll do my job. No midnight phone calls about your dry cleaning. No seven a.m. coffee runs. You don’t owe me anything. And I don’t owe you _anything_ either. Got it?”  
  
She stopped mere feet from his desk and finally looked at who she was speaking to.

Bogart King surged up from behind a massive, rough hewn oaken table. The neutral, mildly surprised expression he’d worn when she’d first burst through the door melted away to reveal something hard and cruel - the face she’d expected. He towered above her, well over six feet of narrow angles, pointed chin and cheekbones sharp enough to break skin. He was a wiry man, but broad in the shoulders. Short, layered dark hair pushed back from his forehead. The shadow of his dramatically-pointed noise and heavy brows left him looking gaunt and a might bit otherworldly. He'd somehow managed to grow the beginnings of a five o'clock shadow by ten thirty a.m. 

She’d seen him before in photos, but there was so much that didn’t translate.

Glacial blue eyes fixed her a look that might have turned weaker-willed beings to stone. Thin lips curled over straight, gleaming teeth.

For a moment, he looked like he might just throttle her.  
  
“Really, now?” he rumbled with a lilting Scottish brogue.

She realized she’d never heard him speak before. Everything she knew about him came from printed sources. She’d known he was born in Scotland, but she never considered he’d still have an accent.  
  
She didn’t reply.

“And just who are _you_ to make demands of me!?” He bellowed.

“Marianne Alder,” she stated proudly, as if daring him to take a dig at her, to drag all of this nonsense to the surface.   
  
The floorboards creaked as he moved from behind his desk, hands slipping into the pant pockets of his three-piece brown suit. She had to tilt her head back to meet his gaze, her features alight with fiery determination.

A stark contrast to the cold fury that emanated from him.   
  
“‘Marianne Alder,’” he spat at her name as though it tasted foul. She saw the recognition dawn in him. His tone changed. “So that’s how you want to do this, then?”

Bogart King took another step forward until he was bowing over her, bristling.  She stood her ground.   
  
Only then did she consider that she may have been a bit hasty with her manner of introduction.

He growled loudly. “Make no mistake, the only thing I expect from you is that that you’ll do your job. I don’t care who you think you are, or what you’ve done. There’s no bloody conspiracy. But if you want to be a wee pain in my ass instead of my employee, then I will _treat_ you like one! Will that do for you, _princess_!?”  
  
His words echoed in his office. He was snarling. There was no other word for it. It took every ounce of self control she possessed not to slug him. But behind her initial reaction, she felt a sinking sensation in her gut. This was beginning to feel like a huge mistake.  
  
But if she gave him any ground, where would she be?  
  
 _You still have to work here._

She took a deep breath. Somehow, she managed to keep a civil tone. “Look, I’m… sorry. That was probably uncalled for.”  
  
The inclusion of ‘probably’ was very intentional. King didn’t miss a beat, and cocked a brow at that.

"'Probably?'"

“This is just a very strange situation. I-” she stopped abruptly.  
  
No, she didn’t want to explain anything else. Her mouth snapped shut and she looked away, composing herself. When she looked back at him, she was in control again.

“Can I get a do-over?”  
  
He straightened with a slow inhale and folded long arms across his chest. For a moment, he said nothing. He simply stared at her. Marianne could see the gears turning behind his pale blue eyes. The rage abated some, and its place, that cold demeanor he’d assumed when she first walked in. Their respective walls went up between them. Safe and distant.  
  
“Fine,” he muttered bitterly.   
  
Before he could suggest anything else, and before she lost her nerve, she stuck out her right hand.

“Hi. I’m Marianne, your new assistant.”  
  
King searched her features, and Marianne saw the look of mild surprise flash across his face. It took a second for him to finally extend a hand in return. She reached for it, her hand dwarfed by his broad palm and long fingers.   
  
“Bogart King.” He’d softened a little. Just not enough to suggest that Marianne had convinced him of her intentions. The corner of his mouth curled in a slight, humorless smirk. “Your boss.”   
  
They both let each other’s hands drop. Marianne tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear, eager to forget the feel of her hand in his. She couldn’t stop herself from asking, “You actually call yourself ‘Bogart?’”  
  
His grin fell. Brows furrowed.   
  
“I beg your pardon?” There was an edge to his voice.   
  
No, that wasn’t going to happen. She ought to have known better. Marianne tried to smooth over her blunder. “I mean, is that, uh… what you preferred to be called? Like, what would a friend call you?”  
  
King replied sharply. “ _You'll_ address me as ‘Mr. King.’ And given that you are my employee and not my friend, I don’t think you need to know that.”  
  
Marianne didn’t pursue the question any further. She inwardly grimaced. She’d most certainly burnt that bridge.   
  
He didn’t wait for her to respond.  
  
“My day begins at 8 a.m., so _your_ day begins at 8 a.m, and I don’t tolerate tardiness. Every morning, at 8:15, we will review the day’s agenda and you’ll get your task list.”  
  
He produced a folded sheet of notepaper from his jacket pocket and held it out for her. She plucked it from his grasp and opened it to find rows and rows of chicken scratches. If she titled her head, she could make out actual words and numbers.   
  
“This will have to do for today,” he grumbled and pointed toward the door. “Have Stuff or Thang sort out your desk situation.”  
  
They stood there in awkward silence before Marianne cleared her throat.  
  
“Will, uh… that be all?”  
  
King, much to her surprise, seemed to be just as uncomfortable as she was, but nowhere near as furious as he’d once been. He pushed a bony hand through his hair.

“Ah… yes. That’ll do. Just… go.”  
  
Marianne tucked the slip of paper in her bag and ducked her head in a shallow nod. Without another word, she strode out of his office feeling utterly deflated.  
  
Perhaps what was most disconcerting was she’d walked out of Bogart King’s office feeling completely at odds.  She’d gone in ready to do battle, ready for whatever slings and burrs he had waiting for her. She was expecting a punchline to this horrible joke that started with George Fay.  
  
She expected to walk out of that office with more fuel for her pre-existing prejudice.

Instead, she left feeling like an ass.

And that scared the _hell_ out of her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hate that E.L. James sets her trash in Seattle. Damn you, woman. Damn you. Why did you steal all the cities I know?
> 
> Adapting the characters to fit a modern setting has been an interesting balancing act. Not sure if I've achieved that balance, but it's something to strive for. Also, I'd like you to know that every chapter of this so far has been fueled by a 24/7 loop of an all-lady rocker playlist. 
> 
> Comments welcome!


	4. Louder than Words

Despite the explosive start, Marianne’s first day on the job concluded without incident, which came as something of a surprise to her. Everything after her initial blow up in Bogart King’s office seemed incredibly anticlimactic. She’d shuffled out of the room and back down to the fifth floor in search of Thang, who enthusiastically helped her find a suitable workspace. Marianne ended up at the corner desk of an empty cubicle by a window. There were no other occupants in her pod, and though she was far from alone on the sixth floor, there was a sizable distance between her and the rest of the staff.

She wondered how intentional that was.

After getting situated, she caught herself compulsively looking over her shoulder. She expected an ambush from King and spent the entire day waiting for it, ready to spring into action if he did decide to stop by and give her hell.

But he never did.

In fact, Marianne didn’t see hide nor hair of King for the rest of the day. She knew that was for the best, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that she'd not heard the end of his displeasure. It had to. And the anticipation was driving her up the wall.

She thought a brief distraction would help. Morbid curiosity led her to google her own name, which resulted in dozens of versions of that damned tabloid photo Thang shared with her. Several of them had text superimposed on them, spelling out things like, ‘U mad ho?’  
  
 _Well this was a terrible mistake_. Marianne hastily cleared her browser history while her stomach tied itself in knots.

At five thirty, when it seemed as though she’d done all she could do for the day, she hauled her oversized gift basket and binder of paperwork downstairs. She made the mistake of stopping by the human resources office to let Stuff and Thang know she was leaving for the evening. They replied with a lengthy, loud string of praises for surviving her first day, which took about fifteen minutes to get through. To her relief, no one else in the office seemed too bothered by their antics.   
  
That also suggested, to her dismay, that this behavior was all too common.

But none of that nonsense could touch her in the safety of her eighth-story apartment. The day was behind her now, and she could indulge in a cathartic debrief after a quick stop for Chinese food. Daylight now poured in from the glass wall that faced the harbor, and the muted chaos of commuter traffic drifted up from far below. She was completely disinclined to think about tomorrow as she upended a carton of steamed rice into the bowl on her lap.

“I tell you what, I should have just clocked him in the face. It probably would have sped things along,” Marianne sighed, reaching for another carton. She started shoveling orange chicken onto her pile of rice.

Her shiny new Macbook sat propped up on the table across from the couch. Dawn’s face took up most of the screen. Dawn was working through a burger. She spoke through a mouthful.

“Then you’d be back where you started: the jobless guy-puncher. You’re lucky the Fays didn’t press charges. I doubt you’d get away with it with this guy.”   
  
Dawn sighed deeply. “Do you _want_ to get charged with assault?” She set her burger down and started working through her fries.

Through the blue-tinted filter of Dawn’s camera, she could make out the pink rabbit pattern of her sister’s favorite sleep shirt.

Marianne shed her own work clothes in favor of a similar ensemble: her baggiest, rattiest cat sweatshirt - the thing had the most amazing, open-mouth face of a Russian Blue screen printed on the front of it - and bike shorts. She’d pulled the short locks at the back of her neck into a just a sprout of a ponytail.

“Sorry, did my sarcasm not translate through the internet?” Marianne drawled, trying to wrangle a piece of chicken with her chopsticks. “I really don’t know what came over me, but I’m pretty sure I just made things worse for myself. I didn’t see him at all after that. I’m sure he was busy…plotting my demise.”  
  
Dawn scoffed. Wrinkling paper sounded like static through the mic as she peeled it off of her quarter pounder. The burger never stood a chance.

“Wow, okay. ‘Plotting?’ Seriously? Do you know how stupid that sounds? Did I miss the part where you started working for a Bond villain? If I’m up to date on this story, then isn’t King the one doing you a favor by giving you a job? Maybe you honestly hurt his feelings and he didn’t want to be anywhere near you.”

It was a laughable notion. Marianne conjured a caricature of King in her head, hunched in a corner, hugging his knees and sobbing, ‘ _My feeelingssss_.’

“He doesn’t have feelings,” she muttered petulantly. “He’s in league with Fay or something. I don’t know. Give me time - I’ll figure it out.”   
  
_Do you honestly believe what you’re saying?_

Dawn made a rude noise. “Oh, come on. Marianne-”

Her temper flared and she leaned forward, slamming the carton of chicken down on the table. “Why are you so set on giving him the benefit of the doubt? That’s always been your problem !” she snapped. “You think everybody’s going to be nicer than they are. You’ve been lucky! You haven’t had to deal with any real assholes yet.”

The volume of her voice increased with each new thought until she was nearly shouting.

“Every second chance you give a person is just another opportunity for them to do wrong by you. _That’s_ stupid. That’s how you get hurt.”

Her tirade hung in the air. She sat back slowly.

Dawn didn’t say a word, but Marianne immediately regretted her outburst.  She remembered how wretched she felt after this morning’s fiasco, despite how she’d steeled herself against him. In spite of her best efforts to see Bogart King as little more than an obstacle, some part of her was still holding out.  
  
Marianne loathed that part of her.

It was a weakness she’d tried to root out. It undermined her best intentions. Her goals, her convictions, her iron resolve - all compromised by an overactive sense of something. Was it empathy? No, she recognized her own empathy when it acted up.  
  
Whatever this was, she didn’t have a name for it. But she was damn sure it was partially responsible for her decision to let someone like Roland Fay into her life. She was none too eager to make the same mistake twice.  
  
Marianne had only begun to work through her take-out when Dawn raised her hands in surrender, the remnants of her meal strewn before her in a grisly scene of greasy, empty wrappers. If Marianne’s reproach had, in fact, gotten to her, she couldn’t tell now.

“Look, I’m not suggesting that you should just let him walk all over you or whatever,” Dawn began quietly. “I get why you do what you do, even if I don’t agree with your She-Hulk style of dealing with things.”   
  
Marianne’s lips pursed, but she held her tongue while Dawn continued.

“All I’m saying is that you might want to ease up on the scorpion routine. This guy might honestly want to help you. I know you read a bunch of bad stuff, people hate him, blah blah blah, but remember the two-dimensional thing we talked about? You can hate him right now, or you can wait and see what he’s really about - and then hate him if he actually _is_ a giant asshole to you. And then you’d be right.”  
  
Marianne’s shoulders slumped. She couldn’t even begin to form a logical answer. She’d run out of words. All that was left was a raw, unpolished feeling about how much she did _not want to do that_.

She was so damn tired of giving people opportunities to disappoint her.  
  
“Marianne, you’re doing the frowny thing,” Dawn chided.  
  
The hand that wasn’t precariously balancing rice and chicken on a splintered set of cheap chopsticks went to pinch the bridge of her nose and smooth out the creases above her eyebrows.   
  
“I know it’s hard,” Dawn’s voice softened, “Especially after what happened with Roland and his dad, and… everything else before that. It gets to me too, sometimes. But not everyone you meet is going to betray you, Marianne. Not everyone wants you to fail. And you’re not as alone as you think you are.”

The look in Dawn’s eyes was so open and honest and _vulnerable_ that Marianne had to look away.

“I know, I know,” Marianne sighed and popped a piece of chicken in her mouth.   
  
“So stop it, already!” Dawn whined. The corner of her mouth quirked in a fleeting grin. “You go about everything like you’re at war with the world, but you don’t need to. Not anymore.”  
  
Marianne envied Dawn. For her light. For her carefree way of being. For her surprising strokes of wisdom. Then again, Dawn was spared the brunt of being the eldest child in a reality with absent parents. Some of Marianne’s behavior was hard-wired. The rest? Well... the rest was hard to turn off.

But Marianne was cleverer than Dawn gave her credit for. She inhaled slowly, her features lit by the warm glow of the lamp beside her.   
  
“Okay, so I’ll try to be a little less horrible to King and see what happens,” she acquiesced. To her surprise, it didn’t kill her. Marianne began rounding up another lump of chicken and rice.  
  
“Well, for one,” Dawn declared matter-of-factly as she reached for her soda, “you might still have a job by the end of the week.”  
  


* * *

Tuesday dawned muggy and overcast. Marianne didn’t realize how much the offices of Forest & King relied upon the natural light until she walked in at seven forty-five. The color had been drained from the building, and the interior was almost as dark and desaturated as the sky above.

A little before eight, someone turned on a fleet of floor lamps throughout the atrium, which helped put a bit of life back into the place. It felt a like being holed up in a big, sprawling cabin in the woods. A bit cozy, a bit creepy.

Marianne matched the weather in her grey slacks and black sleeveless shirt as she sat in the chair across from Bogart King’s desk, her computer in her lap. She’d turned on the lamp when she’d entered and found the office considerably less cold than the day before. A massive bookshelf covered the entire wall behind King’s desk. Stained dark and filled to bursting with books, Marianne had to bite her lip to keep herself from digging into his collection. She figured he’d probably never read a single one of them. The spines were still unbroken.

"Such a waste," she lamented

Eyes flicked to the clock on her screen: five minutes past eight. The chair behind his desk was still empty. She’d set her coffee on the computer’s wrist rest while she set about arranging her desktop the way she needed it. When she heard the doors creak behind her, she grit her teeth and mustered up all the affability she possessed.  
  
The soft tapping of her fingers against the keys of the keyboard filled the room as she began formatting her notes for the day. Marianne found the sound of it surprisingly soothing.  
  
It was the first time she’d felt something comfortably familiar since she left Autumn.

Marianne didn’t look up as the floorboards creaked under Bogart King’s weight, but she listened. Her mind wandered for a moment and she noted King’s long stride, but thought nothing more of it as she caught the blurred edges of him out of the corner of her eye.  
  
“Morning,” she chimed, never pausing in her typing.  
  
He slowed as he approached his desk, and Marianne glanced up to try and surmise why.  
  
King looked downright confused. Suspicious even. But not for long. After a moment, he cleared his throat and sat down behind his desk.  
  
“You’re early,” he replied gruffly, ignoring her welcome.

Marianne remained unphased.

“Want me to leave and come back in...” she glanced at the time again, “four minutes?”  
  
She hoped she’d laid on enough sarcasm for him.  Yesterday hadn’t exactly given her the best impression of his sense of humor. Then again, she hadn’t actually tried to figure that out. At all.  
  
“Ah - no, I would think that’s a bit asinine at this point.” King set to work making himself ready for the day, pulling his laptop from some unseen drawer.

Marianne mused that King might have received a memo about grey and black being the colors of the day, as his palette matched her own - eerily so. He was dressed in pinstripe black slacks and a starched, grey collared button-up. He’d hung the black blazer on a coat rack behind him. She spied a black umbrella tucked behind the rack, but that seemed more like a permanent fixture than something he’d have on his person this time of year.  
  
Then again, they were in Seattle.  
  
“Good. Then let’s get to work,” Marianne replied and reached for her coffee.   
  
King arched a brow at her and Marianne met his gaze this time. Neither of them said anything for a moment, and his expression eventually dissolved into something more solemn.   
  
The two of them fell quickly into a rhythm. Marianne found him easy enough to follow, but damn if he wasn’t the most severe in his delivery. Every other sentence out of him was gruff, or monotone, or just testing. She couldn’t fault him for a lack of politeness - that he seemed to have in spades, though he was in no way liberal with his manners. His statements were brief, to the point, and, on occasion, concisely eloquent.

Perhaps he did read. The dictionary, most likely.  
  
By the end of their meeting, she was staring at a calendar that looked more like a heat map than a schedule of the month’s events. It was no surprise that he kept busy, given his position in the company, but that also meant she would be just as occupied ensuring that this carefully-mapped month didn’t fall to pieces.   
  
An hour later, she sat back and sighed, slumping in her chair. She felt herself overcome by a sudden onset of frankness.  
  
“Man, when do you even eat? You have two weeks in here that are just back-to-back meetings.” The thought made her stomach rumble sympathetically. She quieted it with another mouthful of coffee.  
  
It was possible that he _didn’t_ actually eat lunch. Or eat at all. He did cut quite a lean and lanky figure. His face seemed perpetually on the verge of gaunt. Unless that was simply his bone structure creating the visage of a hollow man in his mid-forties.  
  
King snorted derisively and ran a long-fingered hand through his short, dark hair.   
  
“I manage.”  
  
“Seriously, this is a pretty gnarly sched-”

“Concerned for my well-being, are we?” He shot her a dark look. There was a faint edge to his voice and it was no doubt due in part to the generous layered sarcasm.  
  
 _I will not take that bait, I will not take that bait._  
  
Marianne shrugged and replied dismissively.  
  
“If you want to call it that, sure.” More likely, it was out of incredulity.   
  
He made a noise in his throat and damn near sneered, but seemed to think better of it. She could see the struggle storming across his pointed features.  Marianne could almost sympathize while she watched him wrestle with his own desire to be less-than-civil.   
  
This was a damn powder keg.  
  
King sat back in his chair with a stilted, low chuckle.  
  
“How diplomatic of you.” The timbre of his voice mingled with the accent gave his words a very visceral quality. It had a way of sucking the air out of the room.  
  
“Well, I’m trying,” she blurted, hoping fiercely that this wave of honesty would subside soon.  
  
To her surprise, King dropped the caustic look. His tone lost that bite that raised her hackles.  
  
“What?” He replied dumbly, eyes widening just slightly as he stared down the length of his nose at her.  
  
Marianne already regretted her choice of words, but she resolved herself to try and salvage the mess she was making.  
  
“Trying to...”

 _‘Not make this worse?’_  
  
She cringed inwardly. “Trying to do my job?”  
  
She loathed the sound of her voice as it hitched, turning her statement into a question.   
  
“Ah,” King replied quietly. Long digits pinched the bridge of his nose in a tic Marianne recognized as one of her own, but she said nothing of it.  
  
“Is there anything we haven’t covered? Because I should probably get cracking on this,” Marianne gestured at her computer with an awkward waggle of her fingers. She was ready for the conversation to end.  
  
King straightened

“No. That’s all I have for now, Miss Alder.” He’d schooled his features into an impassive mask.   
  
Marianne folded her Macbook shut, grasped her empty cup, and stood to leave.   
  
“Mr. King.” She attempted to smile, but it felt more like a bitter beer face.   
  
She was halfway out the door, chastising herself internally, and vaguely aware of the deep-set ‘thank you,’ that she could have sworn came from Bogart King’s office.

* * *

The week progressed in a similar fashion. Every morning, Marianne arrived at his office early with her cup of coffee in hand: cream, no sugar. Their days began with an exchange of terse pleasantries and gruff remarks. They reviewed his schedule. She took notes and booked meetings. He occasionally stopped by her cubicle to assign her more errands, and Marianne assumed by the tone of his voice that he may as well have been delivering a writ of execution.

He had such a grim way about him that she might have found humorous if she wasn’t so preoccupied with keeping her head on straight.  
  
By Thursday, she had a list of project updates she needed to prep for  the next editor's briefing.  
  
It was a process she was familiar with, but as a participant - not support staff. The deeper she dug into King’s previous assistant’s files, the more she realized just how much work had been cut out for her. Inefficiencies abounded, and she was sure she could improve upon what she had with a small investment of time. It would just take some thought.  
  
Before she knew it, Friday arrived. The routine began again, though she’d realized by then that their brusque morning conversations had become part of the comfortable routine.

By day’s end, dark grey clouds had accumulated in the sky, promising a summer shower. She was on her way to the elevator around five thirty when she passed Stuff and Thang closing up their office. They were shrugging their respective coats on.   
  
Thang’s looked as though he’d patched the elbows himself. She couldn’t fathom why, or why he’d chosen two different swatches of fabric.   
  
They brightened in unison when they saw her. She managed a smile. “You guys calling it a night?”  
  
Dimly, she wondered if ‘guys’ was even appropriate anymore. Neither Stuff nor Thang seemed to mind.  
  
“Most certainly!” Thang beamed. Then, without soliciting, broke into a wheezy, off-key rendition of Rebecca Black’s ‘Friday,’ complete with hand motions.  
  
Marianne felt her face fall. She’d hoped to never hear that song again. She’d hoped to never hear such a grating version of it, either.  
  
Stuff swatted him with an umbrella before he could get through a whole verse.   
  
“I told you, that song is dead and it needs to stay dead. Stop trying to bring it back,” Stuff rasped.  
  
Thang didn’t let the reproach dampen his spirit. He readjusted his glasses and shouldered his bag with an amiable smile.   
  
“Congratulations on making it through your first week! How’s it been so far?”  
  
Marianne arched a brow and adjusted her own bag over her shoulder. She paused while she carefully thought up an appropriate answer.

“Pretty good. Mr. King’s an interesting guy.”

Stuff pocketed his keys once he’d locked the door to their office.  
  
“B.K.’s alright. You just have to give him time to make up his mind about you.”  
  
 _I think he’s figured that part out._

Marianne forced a smile. “Good to know.”  
  
A question struck her, one she’d been mulling over for the past week.  
  
“Hey, Stuff - does he actually let you call him ‘B.K.?’ That what he goes by?” she asked, earnestly curious.  
  
There was a brief silence before Stuff and Thang erupted into peals of laughter. Their tendency to do that was starting to grate on her nerves.  
  
“Oh, I like you,” Thang said after he caught his breath and headed toward the elevator. “You’re hilarious.”  
  
Marianne could not even began to fathom what just happened. It was well past time to go home.

They parted ways in the lobby. Marianne looked out the glass walls to find the summer shower had escalated into something much more storm-like, and she’d conveniently decided to forego bringing an umbrella to work today. She didn't much care for them, really. After a while, she just got used to the rain.

She stepped outside and fished around in her bag for her keys, shoulders hunched against the rain. She swore under her breath when they didn’t turn up after nearly a minute of fumbling. Water began to soak through her sweater when a shadow draped over her, shielding her from the rain.  
  
Startled, Marianne craned her head around and looked up to find Bogart King towering above her, wielding an umbrella. He wore a long drab raincoat with the collar pulled upright.

He looked down at her with an expression of mild, though guarded bemusement. His pale blue eyes stood out harshly against the hollows of his sockets in the daylight.  
  
“Forget something?” He rumbled. Marianne’s key ring hung off a pair of his fingers, dangling above her.

“Apparently, yes,” she replied, smiling sheepishly up at him.  
  
She reached for his outstretched hand. Fingers grazed the sides of his palm as he gently slipped her keys into her grasp. Marianne shuddered.  
  
“Thank you,”  she said thinly. Her own unease embarrassed her.

"Nice umbrella, Ms. Poppins," she continued quickly, trying for humor. Once spoken, it sounded to her like pure snark. Probably not her most tactful move.

King flashed a bit of teeth - a snarl? He grunted and shifted away, exposing her to the rain once more. She blinked, surprised by his silence.   
  
She turned toward the parking lot and set off for the shelter of her car with hurried steps.  
  
A thought stopped her in her tracks. She pivoted where she stood, squinting through the rain.   
  
Marianne called out, “How did you know these were-?”  
  
He was already rounding the corner at the end of the block, setting off for some unknown destination. The end of the rainbow, for all she knew.

When Marianne arrived home, she peeled off her damp sweater and collapsed face first into her couch, sighing deeply into her pillows. The sound of the rain beating against her windows lulled her into a glorious sense of peace, a place where thoughts of Bogart King no longer puzzled her.   
  
A place where she was blissfully unaware of the phone set to silent in her purse, and its two missed calls from Roland Fay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huuuge thank you to the fabulous asiastana and lightfeather for editing! This was one of those chapters where writing it was like pulling teeth. Tiny little needle teeth. As usual, I'll make little edits for days after publishing. Let me know if I missed any typos. Your comments make my day and help me write better. Feed me.


	5. You Got Demons

Marianne ignored Roland’s calls that Friday night. She refused the two that followed the next morning and deleted his voicemails immediately. After his fifth attempt, she silenced her phone and buried it in her purse. She hadn’t noticed that she’d been clenching her teeth until well after noon, when her jaw finally began to ache.   
  
Anxious thoughts of Roland were slowly unraveling the careful calm she’d composed within herself, and she’d reached a point of self awareness where she recognized the signs when they manifested. If she didn’t channel this agitation through an outlet she could control, she’d be in trouble. Fortunately, she found one a long time ago, and it hadn’t failed her yet.   
  
She packed her fencing bag with the essentials, added a change of clothes, and headed for the elevator. Music blared in her earbuds - a Crystal Castles track she couldn’t name - and she rocked her head lightly to the bass on her way down.   
  
The weather improved significantly overnight, so she opted to walk and take advantage of what would probably be one of the last few sunny weekends of the season.  
  
A walk would also give her ample time to sort through the pile of mental laundry she’d accumulated over the past few weeks.

Roland stayed out of her head for the time being, as she didn’t trust herself to process that mountain of baggage just yet. She thought of work, the caustic and strange Bogart King with his retinue of eccentric employees, and the mess of feelings attached to the whole situation.  
  
She missed Autumn. More accurately, she missed the familiarity and sense of ownership she’d developed there. Starting a new job was always terrifying, with or without the complications that came with being forced to work there by your battered ex-fiance’s father. The situation was messed up six ways from Sunday and she had no clue how to go about fixing it.  
  
Maybe she never would, she thought dejectedly. Maybe she’d forever altered the course of her life with one ill-timed blow.

And what of King? She’d only been under his employ for a week, but she was already beginning to realize just how far-off her assumptions had been. Marianne expected that her sentence to work there would be the equivalent of doing battle with a fire-breathing business dragon every day. The reality of it was so far from the mental image she’d conjured that she felt downright silly.  
  
He may have been the most sullen and terse man she’d ever met, but a monster? That was a word she reserved for people like George and Roland Fay.  
  
Try as she might, it just didn’t fit the picture she’d drawn up so far of King. He’d been fair. When she prodded him, he responded in kind. But never lashed out at her unprovoked. Not yet, at least.  
  
Perhaps it was only a matter of time.

She reached out to press the button at the crosswalk when someone lurched into her field of vision, effectively blocking her path. A shock of wavy hair crowned a face that sported the most perfectly-squared jaw, dimpled cheeks, and a _disgustingly_ effortless smile. The only thing that made him human was the cloud of bruises under his right eye where she struck him over a week ago.  
  
Marianne jolted back to the present, backing up reflexively.  
  
“ _Jesus_ , Roland!”  
  
“Hey there, sweet thing. How you doin’?” He sauntered next to her.  
  
Her features scrunched up into a look of pure revulsion.   
  
“Pretty great until you showed up,” she hissed, skirting around him and into the street as the light changed from red to white.  
  
To her chagrin, Roland hurried up alongside her and fell in step.   
  
He smiled wryly. “Hostile much?”  
  
She quickened her pace and willed the fists at her side to unclench, but they wouldn’t obey.  
  
“What are you doing here? This is creepy - even for you,” Marianne glowered.  
  
“Look, baby-” Roland crooned.  
  
He was rapidly chipping away at her self-control. She stopped abruptly a few feet shy of the curb, and Roland overstepped just past her, up onto the sidewalk. She turned to face him, her features contorted into a look so ferocious that Roland’s smile fell a little. Marianne caught him flinching.  
  
“Don’t call me ‘baby’. I’m not your baby. I’m not your anything,” She pressed in marginally closer for emphasis, craning her neck upward, and Roland shrank back just slightly.

 _Good_.  
  
“You blew it. We’re done. End of story. Stop calling me. Buh-bye,” she seethed.  
  
What she saw in his face just helped drive home everything she’d dreaded thinking about. It was in his eyes, the way the corner of his mouth twitched, and the odd flush of his skin in the light of day.  
  
Marianne furrowed her brows.

“... Are you _high_ right now?” she asked incredulously.

A horn blared to her right and she remembered belatedly that she was still in the street. With a gasp of surprise, she leapt onto the curb while the car zoomed behind her, and she was left off-balance and dangerously close to Roland.

Now he was ignoring her question.  
  
“Hey, hold on, now - I just wanted to let you know I forgive you. No need to get all angry at me; you’re so unattractive when you’re angry,” he held his hands out, palms up. She wanted to knock that smile clean off his face.  
  
“I hope you get run over,” she spat back.

Roland sighed. “Can’t we put this behind us and start fresh?” He reached for her hand, but she slapped him away, turning sharply as she struggled to remember where the hell she was headed in the first place. There was a solid ‘whumpf’ when she clipped him with her bag, which may or may not have been accidental.   
  
He didn’t let her get far ahead, despite the fact that she was nearly jogging.   
  
“I can think of five million other things I’d rather do than give you another chance to be a colossal asshole to me,” She said as she gesticulated wildly while she struggled to string words together that succinctly described how much this conversation infuriated her. “Like - oh, I don’t know - throw you in front of a bus.”

Roland chuckled, albeit nervously, “Careful, sugar pie. I’d hate to tell dad you roughed me up again.”

She craned her head around. “Don’t tempt me. Jail time is starting to sound like a fair trade for setting you on fire,” she barked. They were beginning to attract onlookers.  
  
He persisted. “C’mon, Marianne-”  
  
“Roland, I have a sword.”

Roland blanched. “Ok, I get it. You need some time to think it over.” He side stepped, putting several feet of space between them. “I got places to be, anyways. Have fun playing with your sticks, darlin’. I’ll see you again real soon.”

“Not if I rip your eyes out!” She called after him a bit too loudly. Roland waved a nonchalant goodbye without looking back. Marianne felt like she could level a building with a single blow.  
  
She marched the rest of the way to the studio, absolutely fuming. Her fists clenched so tightly that by the time she walked in, she’d dug deep half-moon depressions into the flesh of her palms.  
  
It took a good ten minutes of level breathing in the locker room to come down from what transpired. She hadn’t been that worked up since the night she caught Roland with someone else.

When she was confident she could handle her saber without endangering anyone’s life, she changed into her jacket, gathered up the rest of her gear, and marched out to the studio floor.

The first match ended in a loss with two points on her; the price for her lack of focus. She schooled her thoughts more carefully for the next three.

The poor bastards she took to the mats never knew what hit them.

 

* * *

 

Monday dawned uneventful. Marianne hadn’t completely divested herself of all the negativity she’d marinated in after the unexpected visit from Roland, and it followed her like her own personal raincloud as she began her morning routine at the office.  
  
There was just one thing out of place.  
  
She sat in Bogart King’s office - early, as usual - with her computer and coffee in hand. Everything was as it should have been, save her mistake. Molars ground together while she dealt with her inner turmoil.

A cup of black coffee sat on his desk, tendrils of steam rising up from the opening in the lid. She stared into the wips as though she might divine from them some hidden explanation for why she’d bought it for him.  
  
Why? She’d made it abundantly clear on day one that this wouldn’t happen. She was nobody's errand girl. Yet she knew better than that - Marianne didn’t do things that she didn’t want to do. The weekend had left her brain more scrambled than she realized.   
  
That notion alone made her palms feel suddenly clammy. Thoughts raced a mile a minute. Was it too late to dump it out? Would he notice if she poured it on the potted plant by the window? She could play dumb and claim someone else had bought it.   
  
It wasn’t like she wanted to be _friendly_ or anything.  
  
 _What the hell is wrong with me?_

She blamed Roland, which was her go-to answer for that question these days.

The sound of the door opening behind her made her jump a little in her seat, which she tried to hide by crossing her legs and glueing her eyes to her screen. She tapped furiously at her keyboard, ears burning beneath feathered layers of brown hair as Bogart King stalked toward his desk. Marianne didn’t look up, even as the silence carried on. He usually had a grunt for her, or a ‘good morning’ that never quite left his throat.   
  
Her resolve shattered and her eyes flicked upward to find him standing behind his desk, staring at the coffee as though it had just asked him to solve a riddle.   
  
“What is this?” came his gravelly, lilting question. He cleared his throat quickly as he shucked his suit jacket.  
  
She was floundering for the right answer. There he stood, decked in his black pinstripe vest and white collared shirt, looking like he might order a hit on double-oh-seven at any given moment. She’d been struck inarticulate.  
  
“You drink coffee?” she replied a bit more gruffly than she meant to.  
  
King hesitated, searching Marianne’s features in a way that made every hair on the back of her neck stand on end. “Yes.”  
  
“Black?” Marianne lifted her own cup to her lips. Try as she might to exude a casual air, she felt like she’d pull a muscle if she kept it up much longer. She was too focused on not melting into a puddle of self-loathing.

“... Yes.” He cocked a dark brow.  
  
Marianne didn’t even stop to congratulate herself on guessing his coffee preference correctly.

She did, however, manage to shrug without dislocating a shoulder. “Then that’s your coffee.”

Just when she thought the silence couldn’t get any more awkward, King set his bag on top of his desk and slowly sat down. He seemed to deliberate for a moment before reaching for the cup.   
  
The entire exchange felt so teenage. Marianne swore she saw genuine surprise in his sharply-angled features. The last thing she wanted was to compromise the already-tenuous peace they’d brokered.

“Thank you,” he croaked softly. She thought her jaw would fall off its hinges if she opened her mouth, so she kept it closed. There was a cautious… earnest tilt to his voice. Thin brows raised slightly. Painted lips quirked in a thin smile.

“No problem.” _Why not ‘you’re welcome?’ Way to go, dumbass._

“Don’t get too excited, though. It’s not going to become a regular thing,” she chaffed lightly.

He rumbled softly. “Aye, you made your position on that quite clear.”

Marianne registered his meaning well enough, and she forced herself not to relive that conversation.Neither of them made another mention of that outburst, or the coffee. They got to work, and the work week began.   
  
Marianne kept true to her word - it wasn’t a regular thing. But it happened again on Wednesday and Thursday. When Stuff tipped her off to his daytime coffee habit - a habit she shared - she ordered a second cup for him before heading into their Friday afternoon check-in.

The same question popped up each time she handed her credit card to the barista: why? It wasn’t that she wanted to prove anything, or force some kind of friendship. It wasn’t her style, nor was it her goal here. Big picture? She was looking for some kind of certainty in her life, the kind she’d had before Roland pulled the rug out from under her.  
  
An extra black coffee a few times a week wasn’t going to fix that, but she never tired of hearing Bogart King say “thank you.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I cannot thank Lightfeather enough for editing this. She's REALLY good at grammar, you guys. As always, thank you for reading and consider taking a moment to leave a comment! Comments keep me from turning back into sea foam.


	6. Keep Talking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This story now has an 8tracks playlist. BAM. http://8tracks.com/estienne/between-the-lights

It happened on a Tuesday. Serendipitous things always seemed to happen on Tuesdays. Marianne began her fourth week at Forest & King without incident. Roland finally stopped texting her cheesy little love memes he’d stolen from weheartit. Marianne was fixated on how he never bothered to crop out their watermarks. She was pretty sure one of them was from a Walmart ad.

Her life began to normalize once more as she gradually adapted to her role as Bogart King’s assistant. Did it fulfill her as editing once had? Not even close. No, it was more akin to the feeling of being stuck on a plane just as it stops pitching and shaking after a bad patch of turbulence. Calm, but still trapped on a plane bound for nowhere. She thought she might have found clear skies at last. Clear skies, a clear head, and a quiet moment to chart a new course for her life. She had no intention of retiring from the life of an executive assistant.  
  
Until one Tuesday in September.  
  
Marianne sat across from King during their regular morning meeting, nursing their respective cups of coffee as they worked through schedules and emails. Marianne didn’t remember specifically what she'd said; it was an off-hand remark about a manuscript they’d discussed at the last editor’s meeting. Marianne wasn’t exactly an active participant at that meeting, but she’d taken notes for King while the senior editors compared their impressions. She did that often and usually thought nothing of it, as Bogart King didn’t seem to care. King rarely ever acknowledged her anecdotes, and on those uncommon occasions when he did, it was a grunt or wordless murmur. But that morning, there was a noticeable deviation from their standard interactions.  
  
“You’ve read it, then?” King asked, his tone even and neutral. He’d sat back a bit from his computer, lanky limbs uncharacteristically slack in a manner Marianne might have called ‘relaxed,’ if she’d been referring to absolutely anyone else.   
  
Marianne nearly spilled her coffee all down the front of her blue cotton button-up. King didn’t look up in time to catch her scrambling to right it, and she thanked her luck that all he managed to witness was the clearing of her throat and shift of her legs.   
  
It took a few silent, awkward seconds for his words to fully register. Yes. Yes, she’d read it in its entirety, though she really had no business doing so. She’d forged a cordial office friendship with one of the editors - a serious, but good-natured, middle-aged mother of two named Andrea - who emailed her the copy after a bit of convincing. Marianne assumed her chances of advancing here were non-existent, so she tried to put all thoughts of it out of her head. But time slowly chipped away at her resolve, and each editor’s meeting only piqued her curiosity further. She wanted, no, needed to read what was coming down the pipeline, just for the sake of knowing.

What harm was there in just reading?  
  
Marianne responded calmly. “I did, yeah.”  
  
When King didn’t chastise her for it, she continued.   
  
“I liked it. The dialogue, especially. She’s got a knack for writing dialect,” Marianne shrugged. Her outward nonchalance masked the breadth of her understatement. She devoured the book in a single sitting and adored it, but something within her suggested that gushing about it to King was a bad idea.   
  
Downplaying it seemed to be safer choice.

“I found her prose tedious,” Bog replied bluntly, his attention shifting back to his screen.  
  
Marianne stole a glance and found him wholly focused on something else entirely. She’d learned quickly that he didn’t have much patience for computer problems, but when he did try to fix them, it usually meant there was something else on his mind.

This time, she didn’t take offense.  
  
Marianne took a beat to consider her response. “I thought it was supposed to be tedious. Sort of in a third-person ‘Catcher in the Rye’ kind of way.”

King’s derisive snort suggested he didn’t agree in the slightest, but his expression of indifference melted away when he looked up from his laptop. A quizzical brow raised above clear blue eyes as he fixed her with a look of bemused interest. It was almost as if he’d just realized she was there and was finally seeing her; alive, whole, and full of weird opinions.   
  
Marianne managed to keep a neutral expression. She was getting so much better at it.  
  
“Intentional tedium is still tedium, regardless of the perspective.” He reclined deeper into his chair. “Ninety percent of the people that claim to like ‘Catcher in the Rye’ are lying.”  
  
Marianne’s expression mirrored King’s; one rogue brow curved into a delicate arch. “And the ten percent?” She asked, unable to fight back a smirk.   
  
King rolled a shoulder. “Clinically depressed.”  
  
It all went downhill from there.In the best way.  
  
The minutes ticked by, but Marianne was oblivious to the passage of time. She was locked in one of the most engrossing, albeit cautious, literary discussions she’d had in a long, long time. Long before Roland, at least. They touched on the last five years of contemporary fiction, dredged up outlier commentaries on some of the classic fixtures in literature, and aired their grievances over what they each considered to be crimes against the written word.  
  
For a moment, she forgot that this man sitting across from her, laughing with her, was her stick-in-the-mud boss.

“The first two chapters were great,” Marianne drained the last of her coffee, which was little more than dregs at this point. “Then the plot happened and I wanted my money back.” The conversation had turned into more casual reviews of the last few books they’d read and neither of them showed any signs of being remotely close to running out of things to say.  
  
King actually laughed and it sounded so natural, yet so un-King-like that Marianne wondered for a moment if she’d been transported into an episode of the Twilight Zone. She hadn’t even noticed how much more at ease she felt compared to the start of their meeting.  
  
“I’m sure Random House had the same thought,” King added dryly. “It never even broke the top twenty.”  
  
“Well it broke my heart, so there’s that,” Marianne offered with feigned brightness.  
  
They both laughed, then. An easy silence came over them - the first lull since they’d started talking over half an hour ago.   
  
For the first time, Marianne looked at King without an agenda. She didn’t try to pick out the ill intentions, his propensity for being a bonafide curmudgeon, or some other negative assumption. She just looked. And he did the same. Their eyes met, and it felt like their respective walls weren’t there. Marianne saw clear through to the other side - the endearing honesty in his eyes, the creases around his mouth and brow that suggested he spent as much time laughing as he did frowning. The strong and certain features and poise of a man guarding something behind a prickly and caustic exterior.  
  
In a weird way that Marianne didn’t want to explore further, it was like looking into a mirror.  
  
Dimly, she realized the tight ball in her chest was gone. She hadn’t breathed this freely in weeks.

In its place, something inside her - small, but warm - flickered to life.

She completely missed the notification on her calendar letting her know that their time was up. The ringing of King’s phone had them both jolting upright in their seats. Marianne nearly knocked her empty cup over as she stood a bit too quickly.   
  
“Bloody hell,” he sighed, his accent atypically thick as he rose in turn, grabbing his phone to see who’d decided to break up their tea party. “I plumb forgot about this damn meeting with Richards.”  
  
Marianne sprung into action, whipping her phone out of her pocket. In seconds, she had an Uber on its way. While King hurried to pack his computer back into his bag, she turned to fetch his black pinstripe jacket from the coat rack.

“I’m so sorry, I completely lost track of time,” Marianne replied. She did actually feel a bit guilty; she rarely ever let conversations like that distract her so completely. What was worse, she had no shortage of work to do. Neither did King.  “Your car should be here in five. Micha’s your driver.”  
  
The strange air that filled the room just seconds ago was all but gone, chased away by the urgency of the moment. They both spun to face each other in tandem. She handed over his jacket, which he shrugged on while simultaneously, wordlessly, holding his messenger bag out to her. She took it without question while he finished dressing himself. “Thank you,” he replied.

In seconds, he was packed and ready, thanks in no small part to their uncanny synchronicity. Marianne had never been one to lose her head to panic, and Bogart King was proving to be made of similarly unshakable stuff.  
  
When he’d finished buttoning his jacket, he reclaimed his bag and slung it over his shoulder. “Get those notes to me by noon, and cancel my one o’clock.” He was back to business as usual. Gruff, but not quite so harsh as before.  
  
Marianne arched a brow as she closed her laptop and clutched it under her arm. “But that’s Ariel Danson. She’s been waiting for weeks to-”  
  
“And she’ll wait one more,” King snipped as he pushed through the double doors and out of earshot.  
  
Marianne bit back a complaint. He was gone before she could form the words, anyway. Getting that meeting to happen had been a pain in her ass. She wasn’t at all looking forward to calling Ariel Danson’s agent and breaking the news.  
  
It would have to get done. One way or the other. Unfortunately, that task fell entirely to her.  
  
Marianne took her time getting her thoughts together once she made it back to her desk. She woke up her laptop and tried to rewind her thoughts, back to the moments before her conversation with King. There was a fairly clear-cut schedule today. Aside from that phone call, the afternoon was shaping up to be relatively workaday. Her chat with Danson’s agent was less of a chat and more like a few solid minutes of being screamed at.

When the dust settled and she finally went about her business as usual, she felt it again.  
  
That odd warmth in her chest. Strange and familiar, all at once.   
  
When she finally figured it out, the blood drained from her face. She was blind to the emails in her inbox. Deaf to Asia in accounting, who had to say Marianne’s name twice from the other side of her desk before Marianne finally crashed back down to earth. Dumbly, she handed over the receipts she was being asked for.  
  
She spent the rest of the day burying herself in work, reminding herself of how menial it all was, in the hopes that it might suffocate whatever friendship she felt for Bogart King.

 

* * *

 

By next Wednesday, Marianne had completely given up on her mission to destroy her fondness for King. She wasn’t any good at it. He’d make some friendly, innocuous comment in the morning - one designed to spark a conversation, that much was plain as day - and try as she might to make herself as boring and uninvolved as possible, she kept taking the bait.   
  
He’d asked her about her thoughts on ‘A Song of Ice and Fire.’ She was ready to lie with a practiced “I don’t read fantasy novels, they’re beneath me.” What actually came out of her mouth was a carefully-vetted, seven minute long John Snow theory, plus hand gestures.

Bogart King was just too damn easy to talk to. When he wanted to be.   
  
So she stopped trying to fight him on it and just accepted that yes, she rather liked him. Though she didn’t think there was any reason to define that ‘like.’ She was pretty certain that her last experience would prevent her from ever developing feelings for someone she worked with, and so far, that was proving to be true. She felt like she was safe to actually enjoy her boss’ company, and not thinking any more of it.

Though he did test her on multiple occasions.  
  
That afternoon, she looked up from the email she was typing to find King looming over her, lips drawn tight, looking especially dour in a black blazer and slacks over a white button-down. She felt a good deal less put-on in her jeans, knee-high brown riding boots, and long grey cashmere sweater.  
  
“Can I help you?” Marianne drawled, layering the sarcasm on thicker than was probably advisable.  
  
“I do hope so,” he replied in a mockingly casual tone that Marianne didn’t buy for an instant. She waited tensely for the other shoe to drop.  
  
Her eyebrows raised slightly as he extended a long arm toward her and dropped an opened envelope on her keyboard. “I was wondering when you might tell me that you RSVP’d for me to attend this.”  
  
There was an edge to his voice that told Marianne exactly how he felt about what she’d done. It took her a moment to realize the card on her desk was a physical copy of an e-vite she received last week for Washington Press’ fall fundraiser. A pit fell in her stomach when she remembered that thing she kept meaning to bring up in their meetings, and then would quickly forget, was this.  
  
She leaned forward, elbows braced on her desk as she slowly covered her mouth with her hands. Somewhere in the distance, she heard Dawn screaming at her not to touch her face while wearing foundation unless she wanted her pores to die. Or something along those lines.  
  
“Fuck,” she groaned when she finally uncovered her mouth. She tried not to ramble, but it happened anyway. “I meant to tell you earlier; I got so sidetracked. I didn’t even get the invite until last Thursday. I assumed you’d want to attend; it’s like the biggest literary event of the season. And it’s not until next week. How did you find out-”  
  
“Their Director of Marketing called to tell me they’re so pleased I can attend, and they look forward to guilting me into donating piles of money to the starving sea urchin fund-  
  
“The Institute for Cetacean Research,” Marianne corrected.  
  
“Yes, whatever nonsense that is,” he jeered.  
  
Marianne wasn’t a card-carrying member of PETA, but his callous response incited her ire. She gave him a reproachful look, “That ‘nonsense’ is a fucking great cause.”  
  
She knew full well she was treading on thin ice. She’d already flubbed telling him about the event; she had no real right to sass him. But she did. King looked like he was about to unleash a slew of unpleasant words, but to her surprise, he didn’t. Instead, he took pause and spoke calmly.  
  
“In the future, please don’t commit me to events like this. I had absolutely no intention of attending.”   
  
“Not a fan of parties? Or do you just hate whales?” Marianne asked softly, her earlier anger gradually fading away.  
  
He slipped his hands into his pockets. “Not particularly, no. Especially ones masquerading as philanthropy. And no, I have nothing against whales,” he huffed.   
  
“I don’t know, I think their intentions might be genuine. They did just publish that big two-part Blackfish companion piece. They even booked the director to speak.” Marianne understood his reservations better than most, but it seemed to her like an awful waste of an opportunity.

“I’m not a big fan of these kinds of things either, but last year was actually pretty fun. Seattle Press sponsored a big literacy group last year. They had an amazing speaker who’d graduated from one of their programs; he read a few lines of Kerouac. Probably the best reading I’ve ever heard.”  
  
It had been fun. She’d been surprised at how much she enjoyed getting dressed up, wined and dined on Autumn’s ticket.  
  
She’d been Roland’s plus one.  
  
Her heart sank a little, but she stamped out the thought before her features betrayed her feelings.   
  
She shrugged. “I’m happy to call them and cancel. I just thought it might be good PR if you went to represent Forest & King.”  
  
To her surprise, he grew thoughtful. Her muttered after a moment, “I’ll consider it. You’ll have my answer by Friday.”  
  
King turned and left without a goodbye. She hadn’t expected one; she’d long-since come to terms with the fact that he just didn’t operate that way.   
  
“Ok, what’s your secret?”  
  
Marianne nearly jumped. Her head snapped to the cubicle wall to her right. Someone had popped their head over. She struggled to remember her name. Lacy, Lana… Lauren.   
  
“Herbal Essences,” Marianne drawled as she reached for her coffee.  
  
“Cute,” Lauren snorted and pushed a lock of sand-blonde hair back into her blunt bob. “No, I mean King. So, full disclosure, I was totally eavesdropping-”  
  
“I figured.”  
  
“-and I was like one hundred and ten percent sure he was going to chew you up and spit you out. If I so much as typo, he tears me a new asshole. I’m pretty much just, like, one giant asshole now.”  
  
Marianne began to remember why she didn’t enjoy talking to Lauren. “Okay, first of all, you might want to use spellcheck. Second, I don’t think that last sentence sounds like you think it sounds, so please don’t say it ever again. To anyone.”  
  
If Lauren heard her comment, or cared, it didn’t show. “He obviously likes you. How’d you do it?”  
  
To Marianne’s chagrin, she didn’t have an answer. Instead, she formed a slow denial. “I don’t think ‘liking me’ has anything to do with it. I just don’t put up with his shit. And, y’know, I do my job.”  
  
Lauren scoffed and sank back behind the cubicle wall, but not before Marianne heard her mutter, “Sure, whatever helps you sleep at night.”  
  
Ironically, Marianne didn’t sleep much that night at all. Not while Lauren’s words rang in her ears.  
  
She popped open a bottle of wine once she arrived home on Thursday to make sure that didn’t happen again. By seven o’clock, she was in her blue plaid fleece pajama pants and t-shirt, reclining on her couch with her laptop open on her lap while HGTV played in the background. Marianne tried not to make a habit of working at home, but she’d never been very good at ignoring her inbox after hours.   
  
The glass was halfway to her lips when she saw an email from Bogart King come through. It wasn’t atypical for him to burn the midnight oil and send her emails at odd hours. There just wasn’t a precedent for her to respond to them unless she was in the office. Still, curiosity bade her click the email with the subject line “Fundraiser Nonsense.”  
  
“You ass,” she mumbled under her breath while it loaded.  
  
 _Marianne -_

 _I’ve decided to attend the Washington Press fall fundraiser. However, if I’m going to do this bloody thing, it will be done right._   
  
_Have a general brief of the sea urchin Institute on my desk no later than noon on Monday._   
  
_And since you seemed to so enjoy the last soiree, you may have the honor of accompanying me as my guest._

 _I trust you will find something suitable for yourself to wear._  
  
 _\- B. K._  
  
 _P.S. No, you may not expense that purchase._   
  
Fortitude alone kept Marianne from spitting out her wine. For a good three seconds, her throat didn’t work. She re-read the email a few more times to make sure she hadn’t imagined it. Reality didn’t take long to set in though.  
  
She’d never in a million years imagined King would ever propose something like that. Especially at an event where she’d possibly be subjected to standing in the same room as her former employer. It was a very real threat, and she wasn’t sure if she was emotionally and mentally ready to face that. How could he even suggest it? He had to know of her disgrace, and why this was such a terrible idea. 

Worse yet, how would it look? It was perfectly normal for an executive assistant to accompany their employer to industry functions, but there was nothing normal about Marianne's circumstances.  She thought to when she'd begun dating Roland, back when she was absolutely besotted without an ulterior motive. Even then, people talked, and it was never complimentary. It all made her sick to her stomach.

Perhaps if she explained, he’d give her a reprieve.   
  
She couldn't do this.   
  
But then she’d be cowering. Her relationship with King was strictly professional, no matter how it might appear to onlookers. And as much as she didn’t want to ever see George Fay’s face again, even greater was the desire to prove that she belonged there just as much as he did. And chances of running into Roland again were slim; last year was a fluke. Roland’s rather had given him an extra invitation while under the delusion that his son had some genuine interest in the event. He’d had no real desire to attend until Marianne mentioned free drinks and food.  
  
Yes, there would be gossip. But there would always be gossip, so long as she was a woman with ambition in a a fairly male-dominated industry. And frankly, she was  fed up with that double standard.  
  
In the quiet seclusion of her apartment, where rampant thoughts ran amok without an outsider’s voice to silence them in, the worst conclusions blared in Marianne’s head. But her rational mind could chase those thoughts away on a good day. Today just wasn’t one of them. Both sides of the argument warred with each other, and she toiled into the night without a decision to show for it.  
  
Marianne lay awake well after midnight, dreading the morning and the conversation she'd have with King, until she at last succumbed to wine and exhaustion.  
  
She dreamed of whales in suits and prom dresses.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry this has taken a while! Please, please, pleeeease let me know what you thought in the comments!


	7. Smoke Signals

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which our heroes are terrible at everything. Except for Dawn. Dawn is the sun and we are not worthy.

At some point between brushing her teeth and parking in the company lot, Marianne came to the conclusion that she’d have to confront King with her concerns. But every imaginary conversation she conjured up just fell apart before it even got off the ground. She couldn’t figure out how to start. Even in her own head, everything she came up with sounded stupid. The doubts and fears that weighed so heavily upon her heart seemed valid enough, but when she tried to say them aloud in the car, they just seemed so silly.

She didn’t know how to turn her feelings into words that would do them justice.

By the time she walked into King’s office, she still didn’t have a plan. They were halfway through their meeting when she found herself absently smoothing over a non-existent wrinkle in her black pencil skirt. It took her a moment to realize the sound of typing had stopped. She looked up to find that King’s hands stilled over his keyboard, and he’d fixed his hawk-like gaze upon her.

She rushed to fill the silence before King beat her to it. “Sorry, just got distracted for a second.”

He arched a brow, and she could practically feel him ruminating in his chair, thinking up dissecting questions.

Once again, she rushed to speak first. It was time to rip the band aid off. She'd just have to make it up as she went.

“I wanted to talk to you about the Washington Press thing. I got your email,” she declared.

Inwardly, she praised herself for keeping her tone in check.

“Oh?” King sat back in his chair and folded long arms across his chest.

Marianne suddenly felt like she was back in college, sitting in the dean’s office struggling to explain her less-than-stellar GPA. She shooed the memory away and tried to recollect herself.

Despite all of her practicing, she found herself in rare form and teetering on the verge of losing what little composure she still possessed. She’d gone into this half-cocked and was paying the price. She'd been so much bolder earlier, out from under King's piercing gaze. Now, as she watched him there, watching her, she didn't know what she wanted. And she was running out of time to think about it.

Marianne was well aware that the silence had carried on too long; if she drew it out any longer, the whole situation would be unsalvageable. So she fired away.

“I’d love to go," was all she managed. No ‘but.’ No concerns, no conditions. No confession. Marianne let it hang in the air, waiting for King to respond. He didn’t at first, and she found the quiet that followed incredibly uncomfortable.

He watched her, but she was relieved to find that his gaze had softened some. If anything, he looked mildly curious, but that did little to assuage Marianne’s fears.

“You would, would you?” King asked lightly. What Marianne heard and what Marianne detected beneath the words didn’t quite match up. She couldn’t shake the feeling that King was asking her a very different question than what was spoken.

“Yes, I would?” It came out as a question when she meant to make it a statement. She fixed him with a look that nearly mirrored his own, were it not for the confusion that had started to bleed into her features. She hoped the look she gave him came across as sufficiently bewildered. Better to deflect than to suggest there was more to her silence than she let on.

“I would, yes,” she said once more with a great deal more certainty. “Why was that a question? Did you rethink your offer?”

King shook his head. “No, that invitation still stands.”

She gave a firm, exaggerated nod. “Great. Awesome. Perfect,” she announced in three atypically loud, perfectly punctuated acts.

Marianne wanted to curl up and die.

Worse yet, King hadn’t said a damn thing. He just looked at her as though he was unsure as to whether he wanted to laugh at her, or berate her. At least, that’s how she interpreted the creases that had formed around his pale eyes.

Finally, he glanced at his watch. “I’ve got another meeting in ten minutes. I’d like to stretch my legs beforehand,” he glanced up at her. “Unless there was something else you wanted to discuss?”

Every insipid thought from the past twelve hours exploded into the forefront of her consciousness, each threatening to take control and be heard. She could feel herself losing control of her tongue, dying to tell him everything she'd told herself the night before. It was now or never.

“No, that’s all - thanks. I’ll have that brief for you ready by Monday.”

_You liar. You coward._

King waited a moment, as though he expected her to change her mind any second. Marianne stood up and tucked her laptop under her arm, and when she did, he took the cue and followed suit.

“Very well,” he said lightly as he fastened the top button of his black jacket. “Thank you, Marianne.”

They went about their respective days, though Marianne she did a lot more typing and sulking simultaneously in a cubicle that afternoon than King.

 

* * *

 

“How about this one? It's so cute!” Dawn beamed as she whipped a crimson satin gown off the rack and pressed it to her chest. She struck a pose and teased out the fabric, as though that might help sell Marianne on the pounds of ribbon in front of her.

Marianne frowned. “Maybe if I wanted to look like a mermaid.”

“You don’t want to look like a mermaid?” Sunny popped out from behind the trio of faceless mannequins modeling the latest fashion parkas. He sidled up to Dawn and gave the dress in question a once over. He might have been a whole head shorter than Dawn, but what he lacked in stature, he more than made up for with presence. “Why wouldn’t you want to look like a mermaid? Mermaids are awesome.”

She wished she could say the same for his sense of fashion. Marianne grimaced and gestured at the dress.

“This is a work event. Mermaids don’t exactly say ‘business,’ or ‘professional,’ you know? And I’ve never liked this kind of cut.”

“I don’t know, I think you could pull it off. Like, business mermaid style,” Sunny offered brightly.

Marianne wondered, as he shot Dawn an ear-to-ear smile, how much of his positivity was borne from a genuine like of the mermaid cut, and how much came from wanting to encourage Dawn’s idea.

“There’s no such thing as ‘business mermaid,’” Marianne sighed, plucked the hangar out of Dawn’s fingers and shoved it back onto the rack.

“Don’t hate on mermaid. That cut would totally work for you. You’ve got hips, so flaunt’m,” Dawn kept digging through the taffeta and silk while Marianne cringed.

“These are all way too ostentatious. I just need a little black dress. Something sensible. Something that won’t stain when I spill my wine.” Marianne shoved her hands into her pocket, glancing around at the sea of brightly-colored islands.

Perhaps she ought to have gone shopping alone. This entire ordeal could have been replaced by a fifteen minute transaction. But she didn’t have the heart to deny Dawn the rare opportunity to go shopping with her big sister. Those days were rare enough. What’s more, it was a chance for Sunny and Dawn to hang out with a third wheel, which Dawn enjoyed way more than Marianne thought was normal.

Unless there was something else going on there.

But that was a question for another day. Dawn pursed her lips while she scanned the displays. “That’s no fun, though. Let’s at least get you something in a different color. You like fall colors, right?” Dawn started to reach for a strappy, burnt orange thing with a criminally short skirt. Marianne didn’t even need to see it off the rack to know she didn’t want anything to do with it.

“Colors, yes. Boob window, no. This looks like a wad of string tied to a lamp shade,” Marianne sighed.

Somewhere off to her right, obscured by a mountain of cashmere, Sunny was snorting. “Shopping for women’s clothes is so much more interesting than guys’ clothes. If I want to wear a lamp shade, I gotta buy a lamp shade.”

They’d been at this for hours, and Marianne was ready to throw in the towel and pick up the first thing that caught her eye at Nordstrom Rack. But Dawn had insisted they try some of her favorite boutiques. The first place they went to just blared the same loud, bass-heavy music, which Marianne was pretty was the same song playing on loop. She was ready to leave before she’d even made it to the dress rack. Marianne ought to have known there was some bias at work when every single clerk at every single store greeted Dawn by name.

Dawn did have a flair for the more dramatic fashion statements. And she always seemed to pull it off. Today, she’d picked out a pretty pair of creme lace shorts and layered vinyl black leggings beneath them. The plain black tee, suede booties, and denim jacket finished it off nicely, and Marianne couldn’t help but think the Dawn was one wide-brimmed hat away from looking Coachella-ready. It worked for her, though.

Just not for Marianne. She didn’t know what she was supposed to look like. Especially at this party. It had been so much easier last time. Where did she even put that dress?

“Hey, what’s up?” Dawn leaned bodily into Marianne, bumping her playfully in the shoulder.

Marianne swayed a little, but couldn’t help the frown that drew her lips taut. “Maybe I shouldn’t do this,” she admitted aloud.

Dawn's brows raised. “Why? You can totally afford this place. And you haven’t bought a new dress in so-”

“No, this fundraiser. I still feel like this is a mistake.” Marianne shrugged, unable to help the exasperation that bubbled up to the surface. She’d talked to Dawn at length about her conflicted feelings the night before, when they’d first begun planning this outing.

“It’s not a mistake,” Dawn replied gently, but firmly. “We talked about this. You deserve to be there as much as anyone else. Yeah, sure, maybe someone will say something stupid behind your back, but come on - people are generally not that awful to other people’s faces anymore. That’s what the internet is for.”

Dawn started sifting through another rack, undeterred by Marianne’s self-doubt. “But we are going to make sure you look cute, feel cute, and give zero fucks about those people. Oh!”

Marianne canted her head as Dawn produced a cocktail-length dress in a deep shade of eggplant. It was sleeveless, artfully cut so to show plenty of shoulder and neck, with an interesting arrangement of folds along the skirt. She didn’t hate it instantly, and she didn’t come up with a protest in time to stop Dawn, who looked far too pleased with herself.

“Yep. I think we have a winner. If your boss isn’t in love with you yet, he will be when he sees you in this,” Dawn held the dress away from herself with a self-satisfied grin.

Marianne nearly choked on her own saliva. “Oh my God, Dawn, that is the opposite of what I’m trying to do here.”

“Relax, I’m totally kidding. Your face was amazing, though.” Dawn snorted as she tested the fabric between her fingers, searching for a label. “I do think you might break a few hearts, though. I wonder who designed this?”

That was still nowhere near inline with what Marianne wanted, but she managed to calm her racing heart before it burst. Sunny emerged from wherever he was browsing with a handful of ties. He whistled softly at the dress in Dawn’s hands.

“Wow, that’s gorgeous!”

Marianne shot him a skeptical look. Sunny held his hands up.

“Seriously! That looks way better than the mermaid getup. You’re going to rock this dress. And you could spill like a gallon of wine on it and no one would notice,” he offered helpfully.

There wasn’t much point in fighting the peanut gallery; Marianne was inclined to agree. It was a little bolder than what she typically picked out for herself, but in this case, she thought that might be a good thing. "Fine."

“Alright. You-” Dawn pushed the dress into Marianne’s arms, “- go get a fitting room. I’m going to find something to accessorize this. Send Taylor to find me when you’re ready, and then Sunny and I will come back there and yell about how sexy you are, ok?”

“You are not-” Dawn pressed a finger to Marianne’s lips before she could finish her protest.

“Shush. No talking. Only dresses. Go, my grumpy snowflake. Be free.” Dawn gave Marianne a little push, which she half-heartedly resisted before resigning herself to the impending fashion show.  
  
She didn't hate it nearly as much as she thought she would. Neither did her wallet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been ages since I've updated this - I'm so sorry! I've been incredibly busy. I also needed to figure out how to make up for terrible "Savage Hearts" Dawn in this chapter. Please review and let me know what you think! YOUR FEEDBACK IS THE ONLY PAYMENT I REQUIRE.


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